Yonder Fund I is an operator-led, early-stage venture capital fund focused exclusively on marketplaces. Founded by Colin Gardiner, a seasoned marketplace operator and former Chief Revenue Officer at Outdoorsy, the fund was created to address a gap in the ecosystem: the lack of a first-check, pre-seed fund built specifically by and for marketplace founders. Yonder is rooted in deep operational experience and aims to be the earliest and most value-aligned investor in marketplace startups creating entirely new economies.
Yonder closed Fund I in early 2026 with $4.64 million in committed capital, significantly exceeding its initial target. The fund is backed by 91 founders, operators, and investors who have built and scaled some of the world’s most iconic marketplaces, including leaders from Airbnb, Uber, DoorDash, Amazon, eBay, Zillow, StockX, ACV Auctions, and many others. With this close, Yonder’s total assets under management grew to over $7.2 million.
Fund I is designed as a first-check vehicle, investing at the pre-seed stage when marketplace founders often struggle to find investors who truly understand liquidity, network effects, and take-rate dynamics. The fund writes initial checks of $50K to $100K and plans to build a diversified portfolio of up to 70 companies. Capital is intentionally spread early to support experimentation, with select follow-on participation as companies prove early marketplace traction. A defining element of the fund is its Marketplace+ thesis, which emphasizes wrapping marketplaces with SaaS tools, financial products, managed services, and increasingly AI-driven capabilities to deepen defensibility and retention.
The fund was launched in August 2025 by Colin Gardiner, after quietly operating a fully subscribed proof-of-concept fund over the past three years.
Leadership
Yonder is led by Colin Gardiner, a veteran marketplace operator and advisor. Before founding Yonder, he helped scale Outdoorsy to over $3 billion in gross revenue, raised more than $200 million across startups, and worked with 50+ marketplaces. He also founded Take Rate, a leading newsletter in the marketplace space. Gardiner is widely recognized as a thought leader in the marketplace and operator-VC ecosystem.
Investment Strategy
Yonder writes early, high-conviction checks at the pre-seed stage, typically the first institutional capital into a startup. The fund emphasizes deep collaboration with founders, leveraging Colin’s operating expertise in growth, liquidity design, pricing, and marketplace dynamics. Yonder is also thesis-driven: it bets on “new economy” marketplaces where AI and automation reshape traditional supply-demand models. The fund’s strategy blends access to elite marketplace talent with agile check writing and rapid support, aiming to help founders get from zero to traction faster.
Notable Investments
Notable early investments from Yonder Fund I include:
Additionally, 14 companies in the Yonder portfolio have raised rounds involving well-known VCs including:
Notable Exits
As a newly announced fund focused on pre-seed deals, Yonder Fund I has not yet recorded any exits. However, several portfolio companies are on high-growth trajectories and are progressing through successive funding rounds.
United States
